From word-of-mouth buzz to well-timed plugs from the likes of Taylor Swift and Adele, social media played a key role in breaking the Civil Wars. With the duo's self-titled second album out this week, Joy Williams finds the Twitter client Twittelator indispensable for keeping in touch with her 75,000 personal Twitter followers — plus the more than 200,000 that follow the Civil Wars. She's also been familiarizing herself with the capabilities of video app Vine recently.

When it comes to social media, though, Pinterest is the real time-suck for Williams.

"I can spend so much time — so much time," she says. "It is a wealth of things I could possibly do, hope to do and more than likely will not do. I look at women who are hand-stitching their own children's clothes and people who are making mosaics from tile they crafted. And I am not in that place right now."

The place she is in, though, is mommy-hood, and that's what makes Peek-a-Zoo Williams' favorite app for her year-old son, Miles.

"It's a little game that Miles can play which is perfect for very long flights, to keep him entertained," she says. The $2.99 game helps toddlers learn the names of barnyard animals and identify different emotions and activities.

"We try not to have him on the iPad or iPhone a lot," Wiliams says, "but when it comes to cross-country flights, in lieu of the 16 people around you hating you or your child actually giggling at the sight of a cow mooing, I opt for the cow."